SERGIO BUSTOS
Citizen Washington Bureau

WASHINGTON - The Bush administration wants the federal government to track down more illegal immigrants convicted of serious crimes, keep better tabs on foreign visitors entering and leaving the country and boost the number of overseas inspections of U.S.-bound cargo.

These are among the border security goals put forth by President Bush yesterday when he presented his $2.4 trillion fiscal 2005 budget request to Congress.
 
He asked lawmakers to increase the Department of Homeland Security's budget to $28.3 billion in discretionary spending in fiscal 2005, a 4.6 percent increase from last year.

Congress will spend several months debating the budget before finalizing a version by the start of fiscal 2005, Oct. 1.

Among top items in the administration's wish list is an extra $108 million to find and deport an estimated 400,000 people who defied immigration judges' orders to voluntarily leave the country.

To track the arrival and departure of millions of foreign visitors, the administration wants $340 million next year to continue its ambitious U.S. Visitor and Immigrant Status Indicator Technology program.

In securing the nation's borders, DHS is charged with an enormous task. Land borders with Mexico and Canada stretch 7,500 miles and are among the most heavily traveled in the world. Last year, the U.S. Border Patrol made more than 905,000 arrests on the Southwest border.

Border inspectors each year process more than 427 million people, 130 million vehicles, nearly 3 million rail cars and 5.7 million cargo containers at the country's seaports, airports and land borders.